“Seigneur. My genius is not innately apt – as this flagitious nebulon opines – for excoriating the cuticle of our Gallic vernacular. But, vice-versally, I am assiduous at striving, by oars and by sail, at locupleting it with latinate superfluity.” (Francois Rabelais, translated by M.A. Screech)

“A wicked law cannot be executed by good men, and must be by bad. Flagitious men must be employed, and every act of theirs is a stab at the public peace.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

pulvinar /pəl-VIY-nər/. noun. A cushioned seat in a temple, or at a Roman circus or other public spectacle intended for use by the gods (or, in their stead, any royals that happened to be around). In anatomy: a bump on the back of the thalamus. From Latin pulvinus (cushion).

“The ‘pulvinaria’ were the cushions, or couches, placed in the temples of the Gods, for the use of the Divinities; which probably their priests (like their brethren who administered to Bel) did not omit to enjoy.” (Henry Thomas Riley)

“In the pre-Augustan period the pulvinar would have been simply a wooden platform, raised up some distance, upon which the images of the gods or the cult objects representing them were placed and from which they would have ‘watched’ the games.” (John H. Humphrey)

ondinnonk. noun. An Iroquoian word for the soul’s deepest desires as expressed in dreams; special dreams. Or, as quoted by multiple sources but without attribution, “the innermost desires of someones’ soul and its angelic nature.”

“To extirpate these repressive desires, or to communicate the supernatural interpretation of an omen, the Iroquois relied on a host of rituals that sought to alleviate what they called Ondinnonk, the secret desire of the subconscious or the soul revealed in a dream.” (Edna Kenton)

“The Iroquois believed that the soul revealed hidden desires through dreams; these desires were referred to as Ondinnonk. If the Ondinnonk was not satisﬁed the soul would take revenge on the physical body through illness or death.” (Art Rogers)

“The yearly festival of this traveling dream theater was known as the Onoharoia; it allowed many Ondinnonk (special dreams) to be acted out very dramatically.” (Denise Linn)

blatherskite. /BLA-thər-skiyt/noun. A noisy person who talks foolish nonsense, who blathers with braggadocio. The speech of said blatherer. Originally a Scottish insult, it became a common term of colloquial speech during the American Revolution due to the then-popular Scottish song “Maggie Lauder.” Alt: bletherskate, blether skyte.

“the result was just nothing but wind. She never had any ideas, any more than a fog has. She was a perfect blatherskite; I mean for jaw, jaw, jaw, talk, talk, talk, jabber, jabber, jabber…” (Mark Twain)

“Those foolish tales which I used to read in my youth […] what are they but the blatherskite of long-tongued persons who could talk faster than they could think?” (John Runciman)

“And naught I ken who the bowdykite’s to wed—
Some bletherskite he’s picked up in a ditch,
Some fond fligary flirtigig, clarty-fine,
Who’ll turn a slattern-shrew and a cap-river
Within a week”
(Wilfrid Gibson)